


Saint Faustina and the Automaton (Part 2 of The Trilogy)

by sarahgene12



Series: Modern Valvert Trilogy [2]
Category: Les Misérables (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Breakfast, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, handjobs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-21
Updated: 2016-09-21
Packaged: 2018-08-16 14:13:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,381
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8105503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarahgene12/pseuds/sarahgene12
Summary: Part 2 of a trilogy. Javert and Valjean wake up at Javert's apartment after their night out. Valjean fixes breakfast and finds out Javert has a softer side. Javert is emotionally conflicted but also very repressed.





	

“Je cherche un homme, un homme, un homme, Un Pierre, un Paul, un Jacques ou Tom, Peu m'importe comment il se nomme, S'il est un homme, un homme, un homme”  
Javert awoke the next morning feeling as though his head had been kicked in by a mule; it took him a moment longer to hear the music.  
It was a record from his own collection, by the lovely Eartha Kitt.  
Dazed, the Inspector sat up slowly, holding one hand to his throbbing forehead.  
“Je n'exige pas un Apollon, Qui sait briller dans les salons, Ni un type fort comme un Samson, Pourvu que j'aie un mate un bon”  
The sweet aroma of flour cooking in butter awoke Javert fully, and he turned towards the kitchen.  
Madeleine seemed to have made himself quite at home in the Inspector’s little flat; he was dancing freely around the cramped kitchen, scrubbed fresh and pink, in only his suit trousers from the previous night. He seemed to be quite happy, busying himself at the stove with whatever it was which filled the apartment with the sugary smell. His graying curls were still damp from the bath.  
Javert gaped. The mayor was standing in his kitchen, half undressed and having made use of his bathtub—and he was huge. It was easy to tell Madeleine was a large man on any occasion, but without a shirt he appeared monstrous, great of breadth and strength, extremely muscular for a man he guessed was at least fifty.  
The ache in his head was maddening. Gemima was asleep on his knees, and he hated to bother the little grey kitten in her slumber, so he waited and watched the shirtless mayor take full command of the kitchen. Secretly, he wondered how the little beads of water trickling down Madeleine’s back might taste on his tongue.  
“Il n'a pas besoin d'être un milliardaire, Qu'il soit beau, non, ça m'est égal, Il n'a pas besoin d'être une grande lumière, Star du cinéma ni prince royal”  
The moment Madeleine caught him staring, he smiled, and the expression spread from his lips and broke like a sunrise in his eyes. Javert’s stomach felt slightly sick.  
“Good morning, Emile! How are you feeling?”  
“Not quite at one hundred percent, I’m afraid. I don’t think I’ve ever had such an awful headache as I do this morning.” Javert scooped Gemima up in his hands and set her down again gently at the foot of the couch; she slept on, undisturbed.  
Madeleine took a sip of coffee from the one mug the Inspector kept in his cupboard; it had a picture of Porte de Martin by Antoine Blanchard on the side, and bore numerous scars from the two or three times it’d been glued back together.  
“I hope you don’t mind the music? You’ve got quite the collection.” The mayor set down the cup and began whisking eggs. Four slices of bread were frying in the pan, dusted with brown sugar.  
Javert shook his head, watching Madeleine curiously. “Certainly not. It was a pleasant way to awaken. How did you know Eartha Kitt was my favorite?”  
Madeleine sucked a bit of sugar from his fingers. “You told me so last night, after you were a bit intoxicated. But I might’ve figured it out besides; she makes up most of the collection.” He paused. “Are you alright, Emile?”  
The old Inspector swallowed hard. “Y-yes, my apologies, I’m not sure where my mind went just now. It’s funny, I hardly remember a thing from last night! But perhaps it’s better that way, yes?”  
“Oh, I don’t know. You gave quite a performance, my friend! You had that vagabond Enjolras eating his words! Now tell me, where do you keep your maple syrup?” He was already rummaging through the cupboards.  
Javert took a moment to compose himself; he’d been shocked at how the sight of Madeleine’s lips puckered around his fingertips had affected him. It was entirely inappropriate. Then he said, “I’m afraid I don’t have any. I prefer to use Karo. It’s on the top shelf over the refrigerator.”  
The expression which crossed Madeleine’s face then surprised Javert enough to cause the inspector to bark with laughter. The mayor’s wide face screwed up in such an expression of disgust that he was turned somehow into a child, one who’d just bitten into something unsavory.  
Javert laughed until he was red in the face; when he looked up, Madeleine was grinning at him.  
“I don’t believe I’ve ever heard you laugh, Emile. It’s beautiful.” the mayor remarked, carefully tucking the bottle of Karo back up on the highest shelf. “Surely you’ve got powdered sugar then?”  
Javert nodded, still catching his breath. His cheeks flushed a deeper pink at Madeleine’s compliment. “Of course, it’s just by the stove. If you don’t mind me saying, sir, I believe that’s the first time the word ‘beautiful’ has ever been used in regards to my appearance.”  
Madeleine shrugged, still smiling. “I only meant it’s a rare thing to see such joy in your face. You should smile more, Emile. It looks good on you.” This time, he actually winked, and Javert was at a loss. Was the good mayor flirting with him? Surely not.  
Once he’d established his place back in front of the stove, Madeleine went back to humming his tuneless song, lazily flipping and pressing each of the pieces of bread. Javert watched at a safe distance, cursing the nearness of their bodies and the way his heart couldn’t quite keep a steady rhythm.  
“Would you like to try?”  
“Are you sure? You look as though you’ve nearly finished!  
“Of course! It’s your kitchen; don’t tell me you don’t cook?”  
Javert looked sheepish. “Nothing too complicated. I’ll only ruin it.”  
“I hardly believe that. Come, let me show you.”  
Madeleine stepped away from the stove, and handed the Inspector the spatula. “Don’t worry, there’s not much damage you can do to buttered bread!”  
“You’d be surprised,” Javert grumbled. The mayor chuckled.  
By now, the record had spun nearly to its end, and a new song was playing. “Chantez-les bas, I can't forget that serenade, and if you listen to me, Just for a while, I'll try to sing for you what he said: ‘Oh in the mornin' baby jes' fore day, in the mornin' jes' fore day—“  
“There now, take that piece of bread and dip in that bowl there, right, and lay it down in the pan. See? Simple! Now sprinkle it with a bit of sugar. Really, Emile, I can’t believe you’ve never made French toast before.”  
Madeleine went on like this for several minutes; Javert hardly noticed. From the moment the mayor stepped up behind him in front of the stove, he could feel the heat of the taller man’s bare skin on his back, and in every cell of his body. He was quite effectively pinned, and each movement of the mayor in his instruction had Javert wondering if Madeleine was doing this on purpose.  
“Once I heard a lover, when work was over, strum his Creole croon, To his lovey dovey underneath the Dixie Moon, I heard him say just so—”  
“Now here, you’ve got to flip it just so or it comes apart. Let me—do you mind? Like this.”  
Madeleine covered Javert’s hands with his own, pressing their forearms together gently but with a guiding force. The inspector let himself be led, raising his eyes to the ceiling and reciting, silently, all the names of the saints that he knew. Now the mayor was humming.  
The inspector made his mind concentrate itself on flipping the crisping pieces of toast. Eartha Kitt was still crooning, and it seemed not quite all of the headache from yesterday had left, and the old man’s body was responding to the Mayor in a way it hadn’t been moved for many years. Javert was fairly certain he could faint.  
When the toast was nicely browned, Madeleine asked his inspector to retrieve plates from the cupboard. “Would you like to eat at the table or in the sitting room?”  
Javert frowned at the little table. There was only one chair. “The sitting room is fine. I’ll just—”  
“Oh!”  
The inspector turned round just as his mug, the one with Blanchard’s painting on it, crashed to the floor.  
Dregs of coffee splattered everywhere; a little of it stained Madeleine’s socks. The mayor, meanwhile, looked horrified.  
“Oh, Emile, I’m so sorry! Oh heavens, and that was your only—”  
Javert felt a little sick. He hated the way Madeleine dropped immediately to his knees to clean up the mess, and he hated that he felt so distressed by the loss of a silly cup. He knelt down right in a puddle of coffee to try to help; Madeleine waved him off.  
“No, no, this is my fault, see that our breakfast isn’t burnt! I’m so sorry for this, I’ll buy you a new one, I promise!”  
Javert watched a bit languidly as the mayor cleaned up his mess. Breakfast was saved; Madeleine saw that his portion had been scooped onto the one scratched and chipped Corelle plate. The other breakfast, half the size, was laid out dry on the cutting board. Madeleine sighed, but said nothing. He drenched his toast in butter and powdered sugar, then seated himself on the couch in the living room.  
The inspector concentrated hard on balancing the warped cutting board on his lap as he sat down. Gemima wound about his ankles, doing the same to the mayor, who had gone strangely quiet. For many moments, the only sounds in the little flat were the scrapes of cutlery on cheap porcelain and wood. The needle had reached the end of Ms. Kitt’s song.  
In their silences, each man suffered. Madeleine was trying to understand why he’d caused such a reaction in his police inspector.  
Javert made himself take another bite of toast; the corn syrup suddenly tasted bitter.  
Madeleine set aside his silverware, and cleared his throat. “Emile, I—”  
A cell phone trilled, causing both men to nearly topple their breakfasts. The mayor steadied the cutting board across Javert’s knees without a thought as he rose, crossing the room in three strides.  
When his back was finally turned, the inspector pressed a hand forcibly on the front of his wrinkled trousers, biting back a moan. He felt filthy. Still, his eyes studied the muscles in Madeleine’s back as they shifted and moved, across the room. The room was suddenly stifling.  
“Hello? Why, darling! I’m in terrible trouble, aren’t I?”  
The moment Madeleine had answered the phone, his face had opened into an expression of sunlight. Javert saw it, and tried desperately to squash the sensation of his heart, suddenly clenching in his chest.  
“I’m sorry I wasn’t home last night, my dearest one, but our inspector became quite ill, and I needed to help him home. Yes, yes he’s better now. Do tell Musichetta to take a pinch for herself from the jar by the door, and thank her for being so good to us. There should be plenty there for her troubles. That’s a good girl!”  
Now Javert set his food aside, brushing a bit of sugar from his lap. His body still buzzed with the Mayor’s accidental touch; it dulled more and more as he sat and listened, feeling an absolute fool.  
“I love you too, my lark. I’ll be with you again soon. Bye-bye.”  
Javert sat furtively silent with his fists clenched under his belly, ears burning. He didn’t look up when Madeleine sat down again beside him.  
Was it possible to hear a man’s smile?  
“My daughter. I’m afraid I left her and the sitter to imagine the worst of me last night.”  
Javert baulked, forgetting himself for a moment and raising his head to stare at his mayor. “Your daughter, sir? I didn’t realize you were married.”  
Madeleine shook his head, cutting enthusiastically into his toast. “I’m not married, Emile, no. I adopted Cosette after her mother died. I believe you were involved in her case, actually.”  
The inspector took a bite of his own breakfast; his lips pursed in surprise of the powdered sugar’s new sweetness. It stuck in his throat as he swallowed.  
“It wasn’t the woman who—pardon me, sir—worked on the streets?”  
Madeleine nodded, his lips tight.  
“I wasn’t aware she passed on.”  
“Nearly six months ago. It is merciful Cosette is so young, to be spared too many memories.”  
Javert took another bite of his toast, wishing terribly he had coffee to wash it down. The confectioner’s sugar wasn’t treating his stomach well. He excused himself once more to the kitchen.  
Reaching up for his corn syrup—it was almost beyond his reach, for Madeleine had replaced it—Javert said, “It’s an admirable thing to do, really, taking in a whore’s daughter. Especially as mayor.”  
A single moment after he’d spoken, cutlery crashed against porcelain and the mayor made long, forceful strides across the room. The inspector hardly had time to react before Madeleine had him slammed against the counter, and a vice-grip on his elbow. The wind was knocked out of Javert, and he gasped when Madeleine’s fingers squeezed hard enough to hurt.  
When the mayor spoke, the voice had so changed it seemed to come from another man’s throat—raw, predatorial, entirely unlike the kind-eyed man who had so fretted over a broken cup.  
“Fantine was not just some whore, Inspector, she was a mother, and a good woman who suffered greatly for the sake of her child. Do not be so cruel!”  
A hard shiver ran hard down the length of Javert’s body. The sharp edge of the counter bit painfully into his belly, but at the same time—it was clear to him now, unavoidable. The mind was afraid, the body was exhilarated by the short bursts of pain, the sensation of Madeleine’s hot breath on the back of his neck, and the force with which he was being held down.  
Javert was horrified. The mayor pressed on him harder, the pain was greater, and yet the noise which escaped his mouth sounded much less like a cry of agony than a moan of pleasure. “Madeleine, please!”  
Madeleine froze; his grip on Javert’s arm released, and the quietest of gasps tickled the fine hairs on the back of the policeman’s neck.  
After a moment, while Javert’s heart throbbed in his chest, the mayor released his terrible hold on his arm and backed away, just a little. When he spoke again, his voice was soft.  
“Emile, I’m sorry. I’ve overreacted. Are you alright?”  
Javert nodded hastily, sweeping Madeleine further away with a brush of his arm, steadying himself against the counter. “Yes, thank you sir, I’m fine. I am—sorry for any offense I might’ve caused you, I wasn’t thinking.” When he dared to meet the mayor’s eye again, Javert felt his face grow hot.  
But Madeleine smiled, a bit disconcertedly. He cleared his throat, and crossed the room back to the couch. “Come, our breakfast is getting cold.”  
Javert took a moment before moving. He inhaled deeply, then exhaled, pressing a trembling hand to his belly, trying to ease the tense knot which coiled there. When he sat back down again, he took great care to keep a reasonable distance between himself and the mayor. They ate in silence for a great while.  
There was a moment immediately following in which Javert thought he felt all sanity leave his body: Madeleine took his last bite of toast, and just a little bit of sugar clung to the corner of his mouth.  
“Um, pardon me s- er, Madeleine, but you’ve got—”  
“Hmm?”  
The snake in Javert’s stomach coiled tighter. Fearing the mayor could see how he trembled, how his hands shook, he reached for one of the napkins on the coffee table.  
“Here, you’ve got a bit of…um….” He’d forgotten the words. All of them.  
Madeleine watched him curiously, that damned smudge of sugar wiping every last intelligent thought from the inspector’s mind.  
“Emile? Are you alright?”  
“Um, yes. I’ll be just a moment. Will you excuse me?” He set his plate carefully on the low table and stood, feeling all the blood drain from his head as he did.  
“Oh! Erm, Inspector, perhaps—”  
Too late, Javert turned back towards the mayor, and realized where his eyes had fallen.  
Horrified, the inspector nearly upended the coffee table in his rush to leave Madeleine’s gaze. He stumbled out into the kitchen, wanting to sob from the humiliation. He cursed himself, and turned his back on the living room, covering his face with his hands and waiting in silence for the mayor to either laugh or express his disgust.  
“Emile, please look at me.”  
He heard Madeleine approach, felt him lay a hand on his trembling shoulder. Without turning, without raising his head, Javert spoke, fighting to keep his voice strong.  
“I’m sorry, sir, I don’t know what came over me. It’s probably an effect of whatever was put in my drink last night.”  
Madeleine sighed; the strong hand at Javert’s shoulder slid downwards to his wrist. “It’s highly likely. Even so, it’s nothing to be ashamed of. Now, let’s try to finish our breakfasts, shall we?”  
“P-perhaps it would be best—if you left. I’m sorry, I’m not quite—” What? The words wouldn’t come; the inspector’s mind was blank.  
“Emile?”  
“The record’s finished!” he blurted.  
The mayor looked taken aback for a moment, then chuckled. “Yes! I’ll change it.” He left Javert on the sofa, leaving the policeman to worry the corners of the quilt.  
While Madeleine was still a safe distance away, Javert asked, “Shouldn’t you be getting home? Surely your daughter—”  
“Oh! Why, Emile, I wouldn’t have guessed you like Sinead O’Connor, lovely!”  
Javert baulked. Was the mayor bating him? Was the teasing tone in the shirtless man’s voice real, or imagined? He had no idea.  
Whatever the truth, the small flat suddenly erupted with music, nearly causing Javert to upend his plate onto the floor. Hastily brushing powdered sugar from his trousers, trying desperately to stop every nerve in his body from humming, he stood again, gaping at the mayor.  
“I wanna be loved by you/just you and nobody else but you/I wanna be loved by you/alone, boop boop ba doo!  
I wanna be kissed by you/just you, nobody else but you/I wanna be loved by you, alone!”  
Madeleine circled around and around the record player, grinning like a loon, and quite frankly, dancing like one too. He wriggled and swayed to the old song, seeming more at ease than Javert had ever seen him, certainly behaving with less decorum than the inspector thought appropriate.  
“Excuse me, Madeleine, are you drunk?”  
The mayor laughed, still spinning and traipsing about as if he were built like a fawn, and not a bull. “Oh, come now, Emile! It’s your record! Tell me you never dance, not even a little! It’s good for the soul!”  
Javert grunted doubtfully, ears burning. “I never dance.”  
“I couldn't aspire/To anything higher/Then to fill the desire/To make you my own”  
Madeleine was holding out his hand, across the room. “Do try! Have fun, for once, Emile!” He laughed again, mumbling nonsensically in some semblance of the lyrics, still wiggling his hips like a teenager.  
Javert didn’t budge. He was afraid to, after the disaster on the couch. He would not be humiliated like that again, by his own body. Vowing furiously to find that young vigilante, and the little bartender, and have them severely punished, he resisted the mayor’s attempts to pull him across the room.  
“I wanna be loved by you/just you and nobody else but you/I wanna be loved by you/alone, boop boop ba doo!  
“Look, like this! No one’s here to see you, Emile, you just have to move!”  
“Please, Madeleine, I don’t—I will not—”  
Between the larger man’s laughter, the dizzy storm in Javert’s head, and the bright sheen of sweat breaking out all across Madeleine’s bare chest and shoulders, the inspector felt sure he was going insane.  
The mayor was of course perfectly capable of spinning Javert as he pleased, so it was almost like he was dancing.

“I wanna be loved by you/just you, nobody else but you  
I wanna be loved by you  
I wanna be loved by you  
I wanna be loved by you  
Alone!”

Dizzy, perspiring, and fearful, Javert zig-zagged his way back to the couch, where he collapsed, gasping. Soon enough, Madeleine joined him, throwing himself upon the sofa, also out of breath. He had landed close enough that their hips and shoulders touched, and Javert wondered if there was a tactful way to move himself a bit further to the right.  
“Well! That wasn’t terrible, now, was it?”  
“It wasn’t fatal, no.”  
Madeleine chuckled. “Thank God for that.” He laid his head back, still breathing hard.  
Javert found that his mouth had suddenly gone dry.  
Remarkably, that little smudge of sugar was still hiding in the corner of Madeleine’s mouth. He almost couldn’t help but stare at it.  
After a moment, the mayor turned his head, to find the inspector still staring.  
“Emile? Are you alright? You’re terribly flushed.”  
“Pardon me, s— um. You’ve got a bit of sugar just there, on your lip.”  
“Oh! Thank you.” He swiped at it with his tongue. Javert could feel himself trembling, and in that moment sent all of his worst, darkest thoughts out of his subconscious, that they might find Enjolras and Azelma, and kill them dead.  
“Did I get it?”  
Javert swallowed tightly. “N-no, it’s still there. H-here, allow me.”  
He pulled a tissue from the box on the coffee table.  
With alarm bells clanging in his mind, Javert watched as if removed form the scene, as if the hand reaching out towards Madeleine was not in fact his own.  
It made it worse, all of it, when the mayor didn’t recoil from his touch; the larger man stared dumbly, only just aware of the line of sweat trickling down between his shoulder blades.  
The moment Javert’s thumb touched Madeleine’s mouth, a gasp escaped the mayor’s lips; then, a sigh in the shape of the reeling policeman’s name.  
“Emile.”  
Javert froze, unable to lower his arm, unable to look away, unable to run away. He was done, he was doomed now.  
It happened slowly, without a word of agreement exchanged. Javert saw, out of the corner of his eye, Madeleine reaching out for him and laying his great hands on Javert’s waist.  
He was terrified, exhilarated by the sensation of heat blooming in the middle of his chest. Now it was impossible to hide how his body reacted to Madeleine’s touch, now it didn’t matter; he could hear the mayor breathing in quiet little gasps and he let himself be pushed backwards, until he lay flat. Another moment, and Madeleine was there, completely covering him, pressing his strong chest against Javert’s and breathing faster.  
The excuse of his intoxication the night before had run dry. There was no rational reason he should want this, no real excuse for why Javert lifted his head closer to Madeleine’s, wanting to know if his lips still tasted like sugar.  
“Emile.” The mayor whispered his name again and it was hopeless; Javert moaned, grasping at Madeleine’s shoulders and finding them slick with sweat. He tried to pull Madeleine closer (how desperately he wanted to taste those lips), digging his fingers into flesh and relishing the sudden cry this pulled from the mayor’s mouth.  
Madeleine rocked his hips into Javert’s, and the inspector got his kiss; hot and sweet and clumsy, and one of the hands on Madeleine’s back rose to hold their faces together longer.  
Javert pulled himself deeply into the man over him, no longer thinking of anything but Madeleine’s leg between his, Madeleine’s tongue tracing the shape of his upper lip, Madeleine.  
The mayor moaned again, and one of his hands fought the buttons of Javert’s shirt until they were freed, until he had his fingers tangled in coarse, grey, curly hairs; his hand rose to the inspector’s neck and squeezed, just a little, and he felt Javert shudder under him.  
He did it again, and Javert moaned, louder this time, and all of the sudden the inspector’s hands were tight and forceful on Madeleine’s hips, pushing them into himself and bringing their mouths crashing together again.  
A sound more like a growl than anything else rumbled in the mayor’s throat, and he began to rock against Javert in earnest, lowering his head to kiss the little notch at the base of Javert’s throat, driven mad by the wriggling man underneath him, whose hands were clutching, clawing at the backs of his thighs; it hardly seemed real that a moment ago, they had been dancing.  
Meanwhile, Javert was delirious. He could feel Madeleine’s excitement just as intensely as he could his own, and he wondered how far he was going to let himself go.  
It was another man pleading with the mayor, another man asking the mayor to touch him, to squeeze his throat again; another man reaching for the mayor’s trouser button and pulling it free; another man entirely who slipped a hand within those trousers and wrapped a clumsy hand around his employer’s cock.  
He wasn’t prepared for what followed: at his touch, Madeleine convulsed on top of him, crying out and lurching so suddenly that they toppled, from the couch to the floor. The coffee table was upended and the remnants of their breakfast crashed to the carpet.  
Javert cracked his head on the edge of the table and for a moment, saw fireworks. Then all was still.  
With his vision slightly hazy at the edges, the inspector turned his head towards Madeleine.  
His eyes settled on the front of Madeleine’s trousers, where the man’s erection was still plainly visible. He knew he was in a similar condition.  
For a long while, the only sound in the apartment was Javert’s harsh breathing, and Madeleine’s, which was louder, and a faint ringing in the inspector’s head.  
Javert was just about cough, clear his throat, anything to break this terrible silence—when he became aware of Madeleine crawling towards him.  
“M—Mad—what—”  
Madeleine’s mouth covered his again, with a renewed urgency, and this time the mayor didn’t wait; deepening the kiss, forceful, pushing his tongue through Javert’s lips without a second of pretense, he used one of his strong hands to push the inspector’s knees apart.  
Javert was gasping openly into Madeleine’s mouth, tortured both by the need to move his hips and the slow, deliberate way the mayor ran his fingers down the inside of his thigh.  
“Please! Oh please, Madeleine! Just—”  
He lost all control of his thoughts when Madeleine freed his trouser button from his loop; impatient, out of his mind with this lust, Madeleine didn’t bother with the zipper, instead taking ahold of the waistband and yanking forcefully downwards, freeing Javert’s erection and sending another hard shiver through the policeman’s body.  
Madeleine rose up onto his knees to kiss Javert again, using this distraction to take him in hand.  
Javert growled into Madeleine’s mouth, taking the same grip on the mayor’s trousers and clumsily dragging them down, his nails biting into Madeleine’s ass.  
His legs were spread like a whore’s; he knew this, and somehow he didn’t care. He was too far along now to care.  
Madeleine had lowered his head again and was sucking scarlet bruises into Javert’s neck, his hand moving roughly up and down now, bringing Javert very close to the edge.  
Javert coaxed the mayor closer to him, pleading without words, his mind lost in a scarlet cloud of lust; the last two words out of his mouth before he came shocked him, might’ve shocked Madeleine, who nevertheless obeyed them.  
“Choke me.”  
Madeleine’s hands closed around Javert’s neck and squeezed, hard enough to prevent the inspector from taking another breath. It was in this state that Javert finally came, spilling without the mayor having to touch him.  
Moments after Javert gave his strangled cry, the doorbell rang.  
Madeleine froze.  
Javert, feeling melted into the floor, registered the panic in the mayor’s eyes. His mind still in a cloud, he managed to realize the problem.  
“Cosette?”  
Madeleine didn’t seem to really hear him; his hands were trying, and failing, to do up his trousers; his expression was somewhere between waning lust and abrupt alarm. The doorbell rang again.  
Feeling utterly foolish, still unable to make his legs work properly, Javert crawled to the other end of the couch, pressing his back to it and praying it hid him well enough. He heard the front door open.  
“Cosette darling! I missed you! Were you good for Musichetta?”  
Javert couldn’t hear the little girl’s reply, but he heard the older girl asking if he was alright, he looked flushed.  
“Ah! Yes, yes, I’m quite alright, there’s just been a little bit of an accident in the living room. Would you wait there just a moment?”  
Javert cursed under his breath, trying in vain to wriggle back into his trousers from a sitting position.  
“Emile?”  
He peered up over the arm of the couch at Madeleine, who stood over him looking extremely hassled. Javert attempted to maintain a sense of modesty by covering himself with his hands.  
“What?”  
“Could you possibly—would you mind—taking these dishes to the sink? I’m sorry about the carpet, I could certainly pay—“  
Javert pulled himself to his feet, using the sofa for leverage. He turned his back on Madeleine to step back into his trousers, shaking his head.  
“Oh, no, no, that won’t be necessary. The sugar should come right up with a bit of vacuuming, don’t—”  
The doorbell rang again. Madeleine made a low whining sound in the back of his throat.  
In an instant, he had the coffee table back on its four legs, and the plate, cutting board, and fork up in his arms and carried swiftly to the sink; when he reentered the living room, he crouched down and began pinching sugar up from the carpet.  
Javert watched him, cheeks burning red. He wondered if Madeleine would ever mention those two words again. If they would ever do anything like— what it was they had done, again.  
“There! Now—” Madeleine strode across the room to the door. At the same moment, Javert backed into the kitchen, fingers fumbling at the buttons of his shirt.  
He listened to Madeleine’s cry of joy as his daughter leapt into his arms, giggling happily.  
“Oh, my little one! Are you ready to go home?”  
“Yes, daddy! Look, Musichetta and me made bracelets!”  
“That’s beautiful, Cosette! Is this one for me?”  
The little girl giggled again, and her father laughed with her.  
Javert turned on the water in the sink and reached for the dirty cutting board.  
“Do you need a ride home, Musichetta? It’s the least I could do. You’ve been tremendously helpful!”  
“Nah, that’s okay. I gotta work in an hour, and it’s just ’round the block. Thanks though.”  
“Of course. Cosette darling, do you think you can wait one more moment for me?”  
“Yes Daddy!”  
“Wonderful girl. Be back in a blink!”  
Madeleine reappeared in the kitchen to find Javert drying the last of the dishes and setting them beside the sink.  
“Emile?”  
He didn’t turn around at the sound of his name, but stared hard at his blurred reflection in the chrome finish of the sink.  
Frowning slightly, Madeleine took ahold of Javert’s elbow, noting the goosebumps which erupted under his fingers.  
“Will I see you on Monday, Inspector?”  
The resolve in Javert gave a little, but he knew Madeleine could feel him still trembling under his touch.  
“Yes, sir.”  
“Good. Rest well, Emile.”  
Just when Javert thought he was free, a second before he realized Madeleine hadn’t yet moved, he felt the mayor’s lips, warm and much gentler than they’d been before, brush the skin just under his left ear.  
A moment later, Cosette and her father left Javert’s apartment, and left Javert, fighting a hard shiver down his spine.


End file.
